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Northwest Territorial Mint

FEDERAL WAY, WASH. – The owner of a large gold and silver mint based in Federal Way admits he owes money to 100 to 200 customers all over the country.

Ross Hansen, owner of Northwest Territorial Mint, says he has not delivered products or refunded money to those customers even when they demanded it.

Northwest Territorial Mint is one of the largest private gold and silver mints in the country.

One of those unhappy customers is Kelly Clifton, who runs a small ministry in Sultan.

Clifton ordered $6,000 worth of gold bullion in February from a small inheritance. A few weeks later, while still waiting for the gold, she says she asked for a refund. The company gave her half, she says.

“The rest of it, we were told, we may get or we may not get,” said Clifton.

Other customers have similar complaints.

Hansen told KING 5 he is not selling products or refunding money because he lost a $38 million defamation lawsuit in Nevada.

"If you don't know where you're going, you might end up some place else."
- Yogi Berra

FEDERAL WAY, WASH. – The owner of a large gold and silver mint based in Federal Way admits he owes money to 100 to 200 customers all over the country.

Ross Hansen, owner of Northwest Territorial Mint, says he has not delivered products or refunded money to those customers even when they demanded it.

Northwest Territorial Mint is one of the largest private gold and silver mints in the country.

One of those unhappy customers is Kelly Clifton, who runs a small ministry in Sultan.

Clifton ordered $6,000 worth of gold bullion in February from a small inheritance. A few weeks later, while still waiting for the gold, she says she asked for a refund. The company gave her half, she says.

“The rest of it, we were told, we may get or we may not get,” said Clifton.

Other customers have similar complaints.

Hansen told KING 5 he is not selling products or refunding money because he lost a $38 million defamation lawsuit in Nevada.

Hopefully Trump got his shipment of brass balls before the mint implosion.

Here is the entire article and I'll add a lot of information that has been posted by the same person who has provided all the information from the Tulving and Bullion Direct fiasco's.

(King 5 is a local TV station)
FEDERAL WAY, WASH. - March 30, 2016 The owner of a large gold and silver mint based in Federal Way admits he owes money to 100 to 200 customers all over the country.
Ross Hansen, owner of Northwest Territorial Mint, says he has not delivered products or refunded money to those customers even when they demanded it.

Northwest Territorial Mint is one of the largest private gold and silver mints in the country.

One of those unhappy customers is Kelly Clifton, who runs a small ministry in Sultan.
Clifton ordered $6,000 worth of gold bullion in February from a small inheritance. A few weeks later, while still waiting for the gold, she says she asked for a refund. The company gave her half, she says.
"The rest of it, we were told, we may get or we may not get," said Clifton.

Other customers have similar complaints.
Hansen told KING 5 he is not selling products or refunding money because he lost a $38 million defamation lawsuit in Nevada.

According to Hansen, a judge ordered him not to refund money.

Hansen is scheduled to appear in court in King County on Friday (April 1,2016) related to the case.

Northwest Territorial Mint has been in trouble with officials before. In 2008, the Washington Attorney General ordered the company to deliver products it sold.

That is a tad misleading, they were ordered to provide honest delivery times that they never did in the past and that's when everyone started seeing 10 week delays that were as high as 14 weeks at one time in 2008.

Next is his conversation with the owner of Northwest Territorial Mint back in January, where they discussed his business in general

Reassuring Call With CEO

January 11, 2016 8:25PM EST
On Friday, I was able to talk to Northwest Territorial Mint's CEO, Ross Hansen, to discuss his company.

Before I continue, there are certainly some people who do not like the way the company operates. And they may also not appreciate the position that I am taking here. I did have serious concerns before talking to Ross, and was quite reassured by what he said. I am aware of issues that the company and/or CEO have had, but only pay attention to issues that I believe may affect the chances of customers getting their orders, which is my key concern.
Here are some key facts he gave me:

•They process about 165,000 orders per year. (450 per day) That means that well under 1% of orders result in a BBB complaint.
•They have not borrowed any money from banks, not even for equipment. They own all their equipment.
•They are also a much larger company than most bullion dealers, with numerous locations, lots of employees, lots of assets.
•About 65% of their business is for U.S. Government contracts, which at times have shipping/production priority.
•Their business model is to offer a great product, at the best prices -- in exchange for long shipping times and occasional delays. They custom mint their own products, and run them in batches based on the orders they have. They could borrow money to have a large inventory, but then their costs would rise, and they would no longer be competitive on price.

Ross was also frank with me that sometimes mistakes do happen, sometimes there are delays, and sometimes things can slip through the cracks. But for the most part, everything works as expected.

This information helps fill in some of the gaps in what I can read from BBB complaints (which provide me with a lot of information). For example, while there is a large volume of BBB complaints, it is small compared to the number of orders they take.
Their business model is also very different than most bullion dealers, and isn't for everyone (to be honest, it isn't for me). And that is a big part of the BBB complaints. If someone places an order with NWT without realizing that there is a long wait for delivery, they will understandably be upset. However, the website does make the shipping time reasonably clear.

Last edited by valerb; 1st April 2016 at 03:51.

I'm a proud member of Eggshellman's Liar, Shill, and bully club and a new member of the Super Jew Defense League!!!

Next is a follow up to his tracking the number of complaints filed with the BBB, keep in mind he is talking about 8 complaints out of 9,000 orders.
BBB Complaint Volume Update

January 22, 2016 8:40AM EST
This is a quick update regarding the volume of BBB complaints.
On January 2, the BBB was showing 203 complaints closed within the past 3 years. Today, it is showing 211. That's 8 new complaints in 20 days, which works out to 12 complaints per month. This is below their average since April.

The number of complaints closed in January is on track to be on the high side. This appears to be due to a number of complaints that were originally closed in December, but re-opened to allow NWT to respond (the local BBB seems to have some technical issues). Even so, it is not expected to exceed the month with the highest volume of complaints (August), which is a good sign.

Now on with the rest of the story

$38M Defamation Verdict

February 23, 2016 7:45PM EST
A Los Angeles businessman recently was awarded $38M from NWT Mint, its owner, and an employee.
I do not know yet if there are plans to appeal.

Los Angeles businessman awarded $38 million in Nevada defamation case

A Los Angeles businessman has been awarded $38.3 million in a Nevada defamation case involving anonymous websites that compared him to imprisoned fraudster Bernie Madoff.

The verdict was returned Wednesday in favor of Bradley Stephen Cohen and his privately held real estate investment firm, Cohen Asset Management Inc., after a seven-day trial in U.S. District Court in Las Vegas. Phoenix attorney Robert Mitchell, who represents Cohen, described it as one of the country's largest Internet defamation verdicts.

"Mr. Mitchell and his client express their heartfelt gratitude for the jury's decision, and believe the jury's verdict sends a very powerful message to those who would abuse the Internet to defame others," Mitchell's law firm, Tiffany & Bosco, P.A., said in a statement.

Jurors returned the unanimous verdict, which included $3 million in punitive damages, against Northwest Territorial Mint, a Seattle-based company that operates a large facility in western Nevada; its owner, Ross B. Hansen; and employee Steven Firebaugh. U.S. District Judge James Mahan presided over the trial.

Neither the defendants nor their Seattle attorney, Dean von Kallenbach, could be reached for comment Friday.

Northwest's website describes it as a full-service mint, a precious metals dealer and a minted products retailer.

"The United States has fewer than 20 full service mints," according to the website. "Founded in 1984, Northwest Territorial Mint ranks among the largest of these mints, providing all-inclusive custom-minting services to individuals and institutions throughout the world."

It lists a mailing address in Auburn, Wash., and a "physical address" in Dayton, Nev.

According to the plaintiffs' trial brief in the defamation case, "Cohen is a self-made man and entrepreneur" who has lived in the Los Angeles area his entire life. He is currently president and chief executive officer of Cohen Asset Management, located in Century City, Calif.

Hansen and Northwest "are disgruntled former tenants of Auburn Valley Industrial Capital LLC," an affiliated entity of Cohen Asset Management, according to the plaintiffs' brief. Hansen and his company leased property in Washington from Auburn and in 2010 were sued for contaminating it with hazardous substances. The landlord was later awarded $3 million.

In April 2012, the plaintiffs alleged, the defendants published the website bradley-cohen.com, which compared Cohen and his company to Madoff and his investment securities firm. The website was taken down the following month.

The defendants soon published a second website, bradleyscohen.com, with similar contents. It includes pictures of both Cohen and Madoff and asks, "Is Bradley S. Cohen the Bernie Madoff of real estate?"

Mitchell said Cohen has had to deal with its devastating consequences for nearly four years.

"It caused him huge humiliation," the lawyer said.

Madoff was the mastermind of the biggest financial fraud in U.S. history — a $65 billion stock market Ponzi scheme that collapsed in 2008. He's now serving a 150-year prison sentence

Motion for New Trial; "Nothing left in NW Mint's vaults"

March 21, 2016 1:15PM EST
On March 14, Northwest Territorial Mint filed a Motion for a New Trial.
Bradley Cohen filed a response a day later, stating among other things "[Cohen's] counsel has also been advised ... NW Mint has dissolved all of the metals they are holding for clients to fill orders and there is nothing left in NW Mint’s vaults."

Mr. Cohen also included a transcript of a cross-examination of Mr. Hansen where he is asked "In fact, you haven't filed tax returns for 2012, 2013, 2014 or 2015; isn't that a fact?" and he states "That's correct."

Writs of Execution

March 29, 2016 2:30PM EST
On March 24, the court entered writs of execution against Northwest Territorial Mint, as well as its owner and one employee, in favor of Mr. Cohen and his company.
I have also heard from several customers that they are being told that NWT Mint is trying to appeal the judgment, and working on a plan to help protect customers. I was also told that checks are not being sent out because of the judgment, but have been unable to confirm that.

(A writ of execution (also known as an execution) is a court order granted to put in force a judgment of possession obtained by a plaintiff from a court.[1] When issuing a writ of execution, a court typically will order a sheriff or other similar official to take possession of property owned by a judgment debtor.)

Judge Says NWT Mint Cannot Refund Money

Sounds like NWTM emptied their vaults so as not to have any metal to confiscate. They buy their metal from Pan American Mining, so they can empty their vaults and take delivery as needed to keep production running.

I would have to assume the people stuck holding the bag for now are those with Gold purchases that they do not produce themselves.

I would hold off on ordering anything from NWTM for the time being, especially anything they do not produce themselves until we find out what their status is with this lawsuit

Just keep in mind this isn't another dealer going belly up after screwing a few thousand customers out of millions..

The following was taken from the comments section and someone's opinion that was able to see the actual site before it was taken down.:

David S. Gingras •

Full disclosure -- I am a First Amendment lawyer, and I usually handle defense work (and thus am somewhat defense biased). Having said that, it appears the website mentioned in this article is still up and running: http://www.bradleyscohen.com/(it is no longer running)

Look at this page, I am going to wager this verdict won't survive on appeal.

For one thing, I have reviewed literally 100s of defamation claims, and I'd guesstimate that about 90% of the time, the claim is entirely groundless. What happens is that a person publishes a really harsh, but almost entirely true, story about the plaintiff. The plaintiff then freaks out and rather than responding in a calm, rational manner, they start using every hyperbolic phrase in the book: "This destroyed my life!" That sort of thing. And they ALWAYS claim to have suffered millions of dollars in damages ($11 million is a popular figure). In the last 15 years, I have seen lots and lots of plaintiffs make such a claim, and so far, nearly all have failed in the end....often after a successful trial which results in large judgment that gets completely reversed on appeal.

On this defendant's website, he said this: "Cohen and his lawyers have sent the threatening letter shown below to this website. He claims that the information shown here has caused “staggering” damage. And yet, not one untrue statement is found on this site."

That last line is a bold statement, but looking at the way the site is presented, I wouldn't be surprised if he was telling the truth -- the page just doesn't look like a typical defamation attack; it looks like someone was very angry at Cohen (presumably having lost money), and they decided to expose some facts about the guy which may be embarrassing. Under the First Amendment, as long as a statement is factually true, it's simply not actionable regardless of how humiliating it may be.

Anyway, should be interesting to see how this one turns out.

Last edited by valerb; 1st April 2016 at 03:46.

I'm a proud member of Eggshellman's Liar, Shill, and bully club and a new member of the Super Jew Defense League!!!

Northwest Territorial Mint, a Federal Way company that sells precious metals and produces medals and medallions, filed for Chapter 11 protection Friday, a month after the company and its owner were hit with large jury verdicts in a defamation case.

Val, you've been an outspoken defender of NWTM, so why don't you go ahead and place a $10,000 order with them. You can tell us here how it's gone.

What part of putting yourself in jeopardy are you having a problem understanding?

Are you forgetting I'm not like you chasing my POT of Silver, as I started investing in Silver almost 20 years ago.

NWTM has already cashed my wire transfers and more than likely thrown those moldy records away long ago or they are buried under a ton of dust nearly as deep as some of these SilverSellers BS.

Actually I never sent a single check for $10,000 at any one time other than transferring money from one IRA account to another or sending over $10,000 worth of Silver in a like kind swap, but in never counted accept for APMEX issuing me a 1099-B for $35,119.58 back in 2010 when they shouldn't have for the like kind swap and I had to deal with the IRS. But it turned out to be a minor problem. That $10,000 issue has been around for a very long time. My very first dealer would only sell me enough gold so it was under $10,000. He said I could come back later when he forgot what I looked like and buy more, wink wink.

As far as buying from NWTM and that's where I bought the majority of my one ounce rounds, before 2004, I never bought less than 1,000 ounces at a time and the most was 1,865 and it still never exceeded $10,000. And the premiums was 45 cents each.

After accumulating what I thought was enough one ounce rounds I switched to the cheaper 100 ounce Engelhard bars for mostly 20 to 25 cents per ounce when buying in volume. Then I ended up paying between 40 cents and $1.00 an ounce in 2010 and 2011 to convert all those 100 ounce bars to small fractional Silver or more NWTM one ounce rounds.

So if you need a calculator, I'll make it easy for you, all my Silver was bought for under $6 an ounce and a few thousand for under $5 an ounce including the premium. So I have had no desire to add any Silver to my stack for a very long time and I'm sure not going to buy any at $15+

I bought some SLV at a higher price twice using the annual limit for a ROTH contribution and some of the Silver bought going into the IRA transfer was bought a little over $6 an ounce. And I bought a little in 2008 when the price was falling, but not much.

I have about 80 ounces of samples I've purchased over the past couple years, but I don't count them in my stack as an investment, I just hope to at least break even on those at some time.

I only recommend dealers who have shown to be reliable over the years and who offer competitive prices. Some have fallen off that list such as Tulving and APMEX is added because so many do business with them even though they almost never offer the best price for anything. NWTM is on that list because they are the largest retail mint in the US and they sell more retail Silver than everyone else except the US Mint. Even though they have the longest shipping time of any mint on the planet, they have a long list of hard core followers that keep coming back for more and that has been the case for far longer than you have even been aware of the Silver market and it has been the same way for as long as I've been buying and I started with them back in the 1990's. And yes I had to wait several weeks for the orders that they swore would be shipped as soon as my check arrived back then, but everyone knew the truth and the information was well spread around the few web sites that were available back then. All the hub bub about them being sued by the State of Washington in 2008 was nothing more than the AG forcing them to be honest and issue real shipping times with their sales orders. For the old timers it wasn't anything new, but it was a real shock for all new comers when they had to wait weeks for their shipment to arrive. It scared me and I knew it was going to happen on my first order. But I got use to it and kept going back for more as they had the best premiums for any dealer and 45 cents an ounce sounds like chicken feed, but compared to a $4 spot price it starts to add up when your buying in volume and compared to other dealers charging much more or compared to an ASE with a $2 premium back then, hey I had the patients and it really paid off.

But today is another day and NWTM is not in the same situation as Tulving or that other thief that stole millions off his customers. It's one thing to go belly up for running your business into the ground because of bad business practices, but NWTM isn't having financial problems because they didn't run their business right or they wouldn't be the largest private retail mint in the US. They are facing that $38 million lawsuit that has nothing to do with their business, but could ruin them if they are successful in the long run. Then again I have no idea what NWTM is valued at. They are a very large operation with a number of location across the country producing products for the retail business and the federal government.

I put out a warning before that if NWTM should ever default, no one should ever trust another online dealer again as they are the largest and most wealthy, but this is a different situation. I don't know that I would be willing to take a chance right now, but that's just me as I'm always leaning on the conservative side of most investments. But as I stated in the above posts, we just don't know what's going on with this lawsuit thing and how it's going to play out. Will it take years to run through like so many others in the appeals process and even if it does stand, will that $38 million actually hold up as a final judgment once a judge leans in their favor? If the company is allowed to continue to do business without jeopardizing anyone's purchase money and that's what I believe they are probably trying to accomplish with this chapter 11 bankruptcy filing, then it's business as usual, but we have to see. So we have come full circle to my statement about putting yourself in jeopardy, it's a potential problem and I wouldn't do it right now, but that's just my opinion and it's definitely not my $10,000 going to NWTM or any other dealer for Silver at $15+ per ounce. Truth is, I don't need any more Silver and even if it was selling at $5 an ounce today, I doubt I would buy any more. If I was still 50 instead of 70, I'd probably have a much different thought about Silver, but I'm like you on my way out the door, only I already have my backup plan with fiat and Silver!!!!!

Last edited by valerb; 6th April 2016 at 01:13.

I'm a proud member of Eggshellman's Liar, Shill, and bully club and a new member of the Super Jew Defense League!!!